After Drake rejoined them and Moustache disappeared back into the bowels
of Phoenix Orbital, the commercial grind resumed.
Easy Frag, in an interesting aside, pointed out (from experience where
he works) that intermodal containers would easily be at least two
displacement tons. After crunching numbers, it turned out the
bog-standard 2.6m-high TEU worked out to 2.76 dton - thus a 2.8m high
version would be 2.97 dton, which rounds up to 3 dton easily enough
(likewise a FEU would be 5.94 dtons, rounded up to 6).
Further, Easy Frag pointed out there's "millions of the bloody things
_now_" and made the very reasonable argument that, given intermodal
containers were in wide use long before the TTL diverged from ours
(26/12/1991, IMTU - I am very carefully Not Considering the implications
that publishing CT and MT in a TTL carries), an adaptation would
probably form the core of Terran unitised cargo movement, rise of the UN
or otherwise.
I made like a starving hobo on a ham sandwich at EF's suggestion.
Nikki chased up 8 dton of apple brandy on spec, as well as freight going
up the Nusku Main - all the way to Shulgi in one lot's case (22 dton).
In addition, she dug up two containers' worth (6 dton) to Barnard and 1
container's worth to Agidda, as well as 2 dton to Dingir.
Departure from Phoenix Orbital was nice and boring, as was the trip to
and arrival at Barnard.
Turns out Badass Badass-Moustache had arranged for an
almost-similarly-multitalented crewcritter to meet them at Barnard
(Eddles is proving to have the weirdest "luck" in chargen - Old Joe is
notably more psionic than a half-housebrick), known as "Old Joe"
(depending on which passport he's using - Old Joe almost reifies the
Chinese-curse style "interesting times"). Nikki offloaded the Barnard
containers while Drake welcomed Old Joe aboard, and explained where he
would fit into the crew.
After fuel and docking fees, the _Paradise_ lifted for Agidda.
Although transit to and arrival at Agidda was routine, presenting the
paperwork to get paid wasn't. For (iirc) the first time since the game
started, Nikki flubbed the paperwork. She needed Old Joe's help to
de-flub the paperwork and re-present it. After that, Nikki tried to
palm off the 8 dtons of apple brandy she had picked up on spec -
possibly due to Old Joe's influence, the crew are no longer welcome to
carry out spec trade at Agidda.
While grumbling at the fuel and fees, El Capitane also came off
second-best in an encounter with paperwork - namely that needed to cross
the border. As EC was still arguing with said paperwork when Old Joe
and Nikki returned with their spec cargo, Old Joe gave EC a hand in
straightening that out.
Old Joe also had a funny-weird feeling about something looming, but
couldn't quite put his finger on it.
Das Boot lifted for Nusku, for a another happily-routine voyage.
To no one's surprise, they were flagged for customs inspection shortly
after emergence, with the customs cutter coming alongside as Das Boot
approached Nusku highport.
"I'm not drinkin' on the job - what else you want?" - Old Joe
After pre-emptive application of a bottle of apple brandy by EC to the
customs officer, the crew, ship and cargo paperwork were declared to be
in order and the customs cutter buggered off.
Transiting Nusku was nice and boring - dock, refuel, pay fees (after
changing quite a few solars to credits), sod off, boost out to 100D, sod
off to Apishal.
"That's what, four boring jumps in a row now? I'm worried." - Herr Sweep
As Apishal's D-class port was congested and they were merely transiting,
EC decided to boost out to the nearest gas giant to skim fuel.
3 days' boost to the GG, 1 hour's leeroying and 1 day to boost out had
Das Boot almost ready to depart for Zaggisi.
Old Joe decided to see if he could help the process - rocking out a
critical success on helping Curly's astroguessing check. With Joe's
help, the jump to Zaggisi took a mere 6.5 days.
"_Five_ jumps now?" - Herr Sweep
Herr Sweep's agitation must have made it through to El Capitane, who
flubbed the flight plan paperwork for transit to Shulgi.
Old Joe had to help out again to straighten out that lot of paperwork
After docking, 1 parsec of fuel and fees, they lifted for Shulgi.
Upon arriving at 100-odd-D, Curly just couldn't get the astroguessing to
converge.
Old Joe shoved him aside and astroguessed the jump to Shulgi - which
took only 6 days.
To their surprise, they found Shulgi congested - bribing their way
though with 4 cases of apple brandy cut the ship's wait down to 17 hours.
Curly made a rough landing, bending the landing gear in the process.
While Nikki blew off steam at Curly, Old Joe delivered the paperwork for
the Shulgi-bound freight they had carried.
Nikki collared Old Joe and they sodded off in search of spec cargo - no
luck on finding a buyer for the apple brandy, but she did find 3 tons of
industrial radioactives. She haggled the seller down from 300k to 270k,
and Old Joe duly loaded it aboard.
Nikki, on her own this time, tries for more spec cargo (and thus will be
spending 10 days at it). She manages to find a buyer for the brandy,
embiggening the ship's stash by 600k credits. Further exemplifying Easy
Frag's manic-depressive dice karma, Nikki also chases down a lead on 3
dton of gemstones. Unfortunately, 30 megacredits is too high a hurdle
for even Nikki's skills.
"Bugger it." - Easy Frag
Nikki manages to convince the seller to split 0.2 dton of the gemstone
lot off and gets duly haggled to a standstill, paying list price (1.8
megacredits) for them.
Old Joe singly fails to find _any_ freight while Nikki is busy scouring
Shulgi's port and surrounds for spec cargo.
His funny-weird precogged misgivings from a few weeks ago crystallise
during this little stint - Interstellar War 2: Electric Boogaloo is
imminent.
Although the rest of the crew (as far as Joe knows) would merely be
interned for the duration as enemy aliens, Joe is on a stickier wicket.
Depending on _who_ he got rumbled as, he might get away with a fair
firing squad, a fair spacing and then a _scrupulously_ fair trial ("The
verdict is guilty. Now get on with the bloody trial.").
--
